A B SHAHID
ARTICLE (July 22 2009): Recently, while discussing the disbanding of the CIA's 'special' operations cell reporting to former vice president Dick Cheney, Director of US National Intelligence Denis Blair dubbed CIA a 'partner' of "the fellows on the [Capitol] Hill". That's indeed shocking - an intelligence agency being elevated to the level of a partner of the legislature, not subservient to it. What really is the world coming to?
This could happen only in the United States of America - the champion, in fact, self-professed 'imposer' of democracy on the corrupt countries of the second and third worlds. By itself, and in its unadulterated form, democracy is the least bad system of governance. That it has malfunctioned globally in the last quarter of a century is indeed a challenge to its survival but not one that threatens its extinction.
But what turn democracy (not immune to corruption) into a joke are the revelations about its incapacity to keep in check the likes of George Bush and Dick Cheney, and an army of operatives at the CIA, who knowingly commit downright criminal acts because they are told that those acts have been authorised by the fellows at Capitol Hill - specialists in sanctifying the holiness of the pursuit of "US national interests".
The worst scenario surfaces when, over time, the intelligence agencies become the law unto themselves by sidelining or defying the legislature and the state, with the blessings of a top ranking insider at the Capitol Hill (like Cheney), or independently (like FBI's J. Edgar Hoover and CIA's Allen Dulles). Such tragedies destroy confidence in democracy that promises goodies like independent legislatures, law-making and accountability.
To Mathew Smith (author of "The Kennedys - the conspiracy to destroy a dynasty" published in May 2005) the assassination of the Kennedy brothers, is a continuing story of "the determination of a handful of people to control the governance of America...... the worrying factor in this story is that this poison has not been expelled [from the system]. It is something still remaining to be done".
The main reason there for is the legacy of controversies that each US head of state carried with him making him vulnerable to blackmailing by the powerful intelligence agencies. The Kennedys too had their share of controversies. That's why, even though after the Bay of Pigs fiasco President Kennedy had strictly forbidden any covert action to assassinate Cuba's Fidel Castro, the CIA went on organising such efforts.
There were hopes that Obama - without a controversial track record - may begin 'expelling' that poison from the system. Instead, by assuring everyone at the CIA that he or she won't be held responsible for what Chris McGreal calls "years of torture, abductions and killings, along with the mass surveillance of Americans conducted under dubious legal authorisations" he too appears to have fallen by the way side.
The scenario has been made worse by the fact that the CIA is trying to defy all attempts at seeking disclosure of full facts about the 8-year long activities of its special cell, saying "it has been disbanded". The admission that it was organised only to assassinate Bin Laden is a poor cover-up because, according to highly respected columnist Seymour Hersh, the targets of this squad were more diverse.
What isn't being realised is that such cover-ups give credence to rumours about even those covert operations that are pure fabrications. Therefore poorly planned cover-ups are hardly the route to re-building confidence in the sovereignty of the US parliament, and exposing those who go on adding horrible shades to that image. It is time Dick Cheney and George Bush were exposed fully and given the treatment they deserve.
That's the only way to re-build US image and to show the world that criminals can't go scot free in America, no matter who they are. That America is governed by a set of fair and enlightened rules of governance that do justice to one and all. That America punishes those who violate internationally accepted codes of conduct. That pursuit of US interests at the expense of other nations is not the philosophy of the state any more.
This is imperative for ending the conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq (the cooked-up WMD affair) and diluting anti-US feelings for killing millions (finally admitted by Adm. Mullen). The US must admit these blunders of the Bush regime. Admittedly, for the overly self-righteous but uninformed Americans it won't be easy to admit blunders, but the alternative is slow yet assured self-destruction via bankruptcy - a stark reality now.
In spite of the propaganda by the Bush administration, which was ably assisted by the Zionist-dominated US media, the world hasn't forgotten that in the post-9/11 scenario, Taliban - Afghan rulers at the time - had declared sympathy with the Americans who died and voted for Bin Laden and al Qaeda to be told to leave Afghanistan. It was a plea for patience on the part of the US, which was ignored by the Bush-Cheney clan.
Afghan reaction was hardly an expression of defiance of America that had trained many Afghans to fight the Russians. It was an opportunity to turn the Taliban against al Qaeda. Instead, the Bush-led America attacked Afghanistan only to cement Afghan alliance with al Qaeda and make a monster like Bin laden a hero. It was not just a blunder; it was a grave crime committed by self-seekers against the US that shattered its image.
Should Obama cover-up this blunder, or for a change, should he insist that mistakes be admitted and justice done? As a black American he has made history by rising to the top in a white-dominated society. He must also prove that he is not from the ranks of those who forgave the likes of Johnson, Nixon and Bush Senior for the disaster brought on the US by their dumb ventures in Vietnam, Cambodia, Afghanistan and Iraq.
As of now, there are no signs of such a courageous stand being taken by Obama. He doesn't realise that by trying Bush, Cheney and their cohorts in the State Department, the CIA and the Pentagon, he will prove to the world that America stands for justice and sanity, and tell Iran that it can't go on projecting itself as the sole defender of these values - something that continues to intoxicate the politically limping Ahmedinejad.
Obama needs more than articulate speeches to put a house in order that remained in the grip of self-seekers for nearly four decades. Politicians propped up by the corrupt and the greed-driven in the US corporate sector, have left behind a legacy that can't be undone by 'bail-out' packages alone. Americans don't only need to eat and live comfortably but, far more than that, need to re-learn the difference between right and wrong.
Obama needs to set an historic example thereof by trying George Bush, Cheney and their cohorts, for their crimes against the much adored US interests, if not against humanity. If warmongers from Cambodia, Congo, Liberia, Rwanda, and Yugoslavia can be tried by the International Court of Justice, Bush and Cheney can be tried for war crimes within the US; it will raise America's stature to what it was under Abraham Lincoln.
This could happen only in the United States of America - the champion, in fact, self-professed 'imposer' of democracy on the corrupt countries of the second and third worlds. By itself, and in its unadulterated form, democracy is the least bad system of governance. That it has malfunctioned globally in the last quarter of a century is indeed a challenge to its survival but not one that threatens its extinction.
But what turn democracy (not immune to corruption) into a joke are the revelations about its incapacity to keep in check the likes of George Bush and Dick Cheney, and an army of operatives at the CIA, who knowingly commit downright criminal acts because they are told that those acts have been authorised by the fellows at Capitol Hill - specialists in sanctifying the holiness of the pursuit of "US national interests".
The worst scenario surfaces when, over time, the intelligence agencies become the law unto themselves by sidelining or defying the legislature and the state, with the blessings of a top ranking insider at the Capitol Hill (like Cheney), or independently (like FBI's J. Edgar Hoover and CIA's Allen Dulles). Such tragedies destroy confidence in democracy that promises goodies like independent legislatures, law-making and accountability.
To Mathew Smith (author of "The Kennedys - the conspiracy to destroy a dynasty" published in May 2005) the assassination of the Kennedy brothers, is a continuing story of "the determination of a handful of people to control the governance of America...... the worrying factor in this story is that this poison has not been expelled [from the system]. It is something still remaining to be done".
The main reason there for is the legacy of controversies that each US head of state carried with him making him vulnerable to blackmailing by the powerful intelligence agencies. The Kennedys too had their share of controversies. That's why, even though after the Bay of Pigs fiasco President Kennedy had strictly forbidden any covert action to assassinate Cuba's Fidel Castro, the CIA went on organising such efforts.
There were hopes that Obama - without a controversial track record - may begin 'expelling' that poison from the system. Instead, by assuring everyone at the CIA that he or she won't be held responsible for what Chris McGreal calls "years of torture, abductions and killings, along with the mass surveillance of Americans conducted under dubious legal authorisations" he too appears to have fallen by the way side.
The scenario has been made worse by the fact that the CIA is trying to defy all attempts at seeking disclosure of full facts about the 8-year long activities of its special cell, saying "it has been disbanded". The admission that it was organised only to assassinate Bin Laden is a poor cover-up because, according to highly respected columnist Seymour Hersh, the targets of this squad were more diverse.
What isn't being realised is that such cover-ups give credence to rumours about even those covert operations that are pure fabrications. Therefore poorly planned cover-ups are hardly the route to re-building confidence in the sovereignty of the US parliament, and exposing those who go on adding horrible shades to that image. It is time Dick Cheney and George Bush were exposed fully and given the treatment they deserve.
That's the only way to re-build US image and to show the world that criminals can't go scot free in America, no matter who they are. That America is governed by a set of fair and enlightened rules of governance that do justice to one and all. That America punishes those who violate internationally accepted codes of conduct. That pursuit of US interests at the expense of other nations is not the philosophy of the state any more.
This is imperative for ending the conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq (the cooked-up WMD affair) and diluting anti-US feelings for killing millions (finally admitted by Adm. Mullen). The US must admit these blunders of the Bush regime. Admittedly, for the overly self-righteous but uninformed Americans it won't be easy to admit blunders, but the alternative is slow yet assured self-destruction via bankruptcy - a stark reality now.
In spite of the propaganda by the Bush administration, which was ably assisted by the Zionist-dominated US media, the world hasn't forgotten that in the post-9/11 scenario, Taliban - Afghan rulers at the time - had declared sympathy with the Americans who died and voted for Bin Laden and al Qaeda to be told to leave Afghanistan. It was a plea for patience on the part of the US, which was ignored by the Bush-Cheney clan.
Afghan reaction was hardly an expression of defiance of America that had trained many Afghans to fight the Russians. It was an opportunity to turn the Taliban against al Qaeda. Instead, the Bush-led America attacked Afghanistan only to cement Afghan alliance with al Qaeda and make a monster like Bin laden a hero. It was not just a blunder; it was a grave crime committed by self-seekers against the US that shattered its image.
Should Obama cover-up this blunder, or for a change, should he insist that mistakes be admitted and justice done? As a black American he has made history by rising to the top in a white-dominated society. He must also prove that he is not from the ranks of those who forgave the likes of Johnson, Nixon and Bush Senior for the disaster brought on the US by their dumb ventures in Vietnam, Cambodia, Afghanistan and Iraq.
As of now, there are no signs of such a courageous stand being taken by Obama. He doesn't realise that by trying Bush, Cheney and their cohorts in the State Department, the CIA and the Pentagon, he will prove to the world that America stands for justice and sanity, and tell Iran that it can't go on projecting itself as the sole defender of these values - something that continues to intoxicate the politically limping Ahmedinejad.
Obama needs more than articulate speeches to put a house in order that remained in the grip of self-seekers for nearly four decades. Politicians propped up by the corrupt and the greed-driven in the US corporate sector, have left behind a legacy that can't be undone by 'bail-out' packages alone. Americans don't only need to eat and live comfortably but, far more than that, need to re-learn the difference between right and wrong.
Obama needs to set an historic example thereof by trying George Bush, Cheney and their cohorts, for their crimes against the much adored US interests, if not against humanity. If warmongers from Cambodia, Congo, Liberia, Rwanda, and Yugoslavia can be tried by the International Court of Justice, Bush and Cheney can be tried for war crimes within the US; it will raise America's stature to what it was under Abraham Lincoln.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2009
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